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When competing for food and resources, bacteria employ elaborate strategies to keep rival cells at bay. Scientists have now identified a pathway that allows disease-causing bacteria to attack other bacterial cells by breaking down their cell wall.

Pseudomonas aeruginosa is a type of bacteria readily found in everyday environments. It easily forms colonies in a wide variety of settings, including medical devices, body organs and skin wounds. This allows it to cause disease and act as a major pathogen, particularly in hospitals.

Nanotechnology has developed tremendously in the past decade and was able to create many new materials with a vast range of potential applications. Carbon nanotubes are an example of these new materials and consist of cylindrical molecules of carbon with diameters of a few nanometers – one nanometer is one millionth of a millimeter. Carbon nanotubes possess exceptional electronic, mechanical and chemical properties, for example they can be used to clean polluted water.

Incidence rates of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) and intrahepatic cholangiocarcinoma (ICC) have increased in the U.S. This population-based study publishing in the August issue of Hepatology, a journal of the American Association for the Study of Liver Diseases, found that metabolic syndrome significantly increases risk of developing these primary liver cancers.

A software program developed by a Penn State synthetic biologist could provide biotechnology companies with genetic plans to help them turn bacteria into molecular factories, capable of producing everything from biofuels to medicine.

July 20, 2011 – BGI (previously known as the Beijing Genomics Institute), the largest genomics organization in the world, and Kunming Institute of Zoology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, together published the whole sequence variation map of rhesus macaque (Macaca mulatta) in Genome Biology on July 6th, 2011 (http://genomebiology.com/2011/12/7/R63). The study provides available resources for evolutionary and biomedical research.

Engineers at the University of Leicester have for the first time created a way of measuring how much force is used during a stabbing using a broken bottle. The advance is expected to have significant implications for legal forensics.

Washington, DC – A Georgetown University Medical Center (GUMC) scientist who has previously discovered antimicrobial compounds in the skin of frogs and in the dogfish shark has now turned his attention to the remarkable wound healing abilities of dolphins.

A dolphin's ability to heal quickly from a shark bite with apparent indifference to pain, resistance to infection, hemorrhage protection, and near-restoration of normal body contour might provide insights for the care of human injuries, says Michael Zasloff, M.D., Ph.D.

Scientists now understand more about why being exposed to nicotine while you were a fetus will increase your risk of developing cardiovascular disease as an adult. "We have found distinct links between cigarette smoking or even using nicotine patches or gum and the long-term harm for the child," says Dr. DaLiao Xiao, a scientist who works at the Loma Linda University School of Medicine in California.

Scientists of the Medical Faculty of the University Münster and the University Hospital Münster in collaboration with scientists of the enterprise `Life Technologies Corporation´ were the first to release a draft genome sequence of a German enterohemorrhagic E. coli (EHEC) 2011 outbreak strain on June 3rd. Their in-depth genomic characterization of this outbreak was published on July 20th in the online open access journal PLoS ONE.

ANN ARBOR, Mich.---While studying concussions in a high school football team, researchers captured the impact of an 18-year-old player who broke his neck during a head-down tackle in real-time.

Steven Broglio, an assistant professor in the University of Michigan School of Kinesiology, studies concussive impacts. His lab is the high school football field. The injured student in the study in Illinois healed and was cleared 12 weeks later to play basketball, Broglio said.

Washington, D.C. – Devices marketed as "electronic cigarettes" are in reality crude drug delivery systems for refined nicotine, posing unknown risks with little new benefits to smokers, according to tobacco control experts.

The American College of Radiology (ACR) and Society of Breast Imaging applaud and support updated American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists' (ACOG) recommendations that women begin getting annual mammograms at age 40. The updated ACOG recommendations now correspond with those of the American Cancer Society, ACR, Society of Breast Imaging (SBI), American Society of Breast Disease (ASBD) and many other major medical associations with demonstrated expertise in breast cancer care.

ST. PAUL, Minn. – A new study examining the cost-effectiveness of drugs to treat multiple sclerosis (MS) in the United States finds that the health gains from these drugs come at a very high cost compared to basic therapy to control the symptoms of MS and compared to treatments for other chronic diseases. The research is published in the July 20, 2011, online issue of Neurology®, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology.

Birds use their bills largely to forage and eat, and these behaviors strongly influence the shape and size of a bird's bill. But the bill can play an important role in regulating the bird's body temperature by acting as a radiator for excess heat. A team of scientists have found that because of this, high summer temperatures have been a strong influence in determining bill size in some birds, particularly species of sparrows that favor salt marshes. The team's findings are published in the scientific journal Ecography, July 20.

Los Angeles, (July 2011) — Despite helping to push Hosni Mubarak and his regime from power, Egypt's liberals and pro-democracy activists are having trouble moving from revolution to politics, according to a recent article in the World Policy Journal (published by SAGE).